It was 9 AM on a bright and sunny summer morning. The sprawling lake near ERA’s grounds helped give the morning breeze a light, cool mist, helping the students still in a dream-like haze to fully wake up. There was not a sound to be heard other than the chirping of crickets and the light rustling of trees off in the distance, not a cloud in the sky to block the sun’s rays, not a single sign the world was not hugging you and saying “come on buddy, time to make the most of the day,” making this a perfect, picture-esque Saturday morning to everyone except the inhabitants of Dorm 5, groggily stumbling to shut the blinds.
“Goooood, fuuuuuck…” mumbled Penny, holding herself up by the cord she just pulled down. “Christ, my head is… buh, ugh, what the hell did I drink last night…”
“Wine, I think.”
“Huh?”
“Wine. What you had to drink last night, was wine,” said Lucas, partially dangling off the second floor of a bunk bed, using his hoodie as a belt and his shirt as an eye cover. “I… think, pretty sure it was wine, but like.. Could have been cough syrup for all I know. More importantly, though, what you-… what we didn’t drink, was water. No water to go around. Tap’s… tap’s out of commission.”
Dorm 5’s reputation was already not one of prestigious quality by being simultaneously used as a mad scientist’s lab, a public landfill, and the world’s most extensive bacon collection, but being looked down upon by the greater campus populace does come with its benefits. If the campus administration already preemptively assumes your dorm violates every single hygienic and constructional standard, they don’t really see the value in surprise checks to your dorm. What would they expect to find, even worse violations of dorm contracts? Couldn’t be worse than the time machine taking out power in the entire campus.
This particular conflict between school faculty and school alumni meant that if you needed to quickly organise something away from the prying eyes of security, you’d knock on the Disaster Trio’s door, think of the best way of selling whatever idea you had to pitch, and prayed you didn’t decide to knock on the exact day they made a machine that turns people into chickens.
“What do you mean out of- hol’ on, didn’… didn’t you get the drinks?”
“Yea.”
“So how d’you- why d’you not know what we got to drink?”
“Issnot mine.”
“what?”
“I took it. From the clover,” Lucas answered. “Four.. uh, four pronged clover. Four faced clover. Whatever. ‘snot mine.”
“From fuckin’ where did you take it?”
“The… uhhh.. You know-” “I really don’t.” “-the underground casino.”
“…the what?” “Underground casino.” “Underground casino?” “Yea.” “You all have a casino going around?” “Yea.” “And you get on our ass for the fight ring?” “There’s another fight ring?” “A ‘nother ring???” “god will both of you shut the fuck up.”
Recently awoken, incredibly cranky, and currently hugging a bucket in the closet was Artemis. “I could barely sleep the whole night because I was too busy cleaning out my stomach using your expired, acidic cough syrup, and now,” she said while pointing an accusatory finger, still with her face pointed into the bucket, “both of you will not stop blabbering about… I don’t even know what, the four-leaf clover, right?” “oh that’s what it’s called, yea.” Penny stumbled in, “Oh, you also know of the dumbass casino?” “Worked there for a while, yeah.” “Alright, so, fuckin’, am I just gonna be left out of all the cool shit in this place?” “The point of an underground casino, sweetcheeks,” added a face-down-in-her-own-spit Jesse, “is that not everyone gets to know about it.”
Lucas waved his hand in no particular direction, “mornin’ you two.” “Good morning, candy thief,” replied Artemis, “are you ever planning to just… pay for goods and services with money you earn?” “Not with money I earn.” “‘course you wouldn’t-…” she heaved, and puked some more into the bucket. “…Attagirl.”
As a break from the onslaught of endless insanity that was normal campus life, the heads of the student council decided that a beach day to the local lake was the perfect way to get everyone a little less tense, and to introduce the new faces on campus to their new peers. After four days of unreasonably heated debate regarding whether or not “a beach day!” was an appropriate title for a visit to an inland body of water, finally settling on the signs just calling it “a day!”, the campus excursion came to a screeching halt when it started raining on the very day they had scheduled to go.
Instead of just calling it quits, the council decided to utilise everyone’s high spirits by organising a party that very night. They got everyone interested, asked dorm 5 if they were cool with a bunch of not-american-drinking-age students being utterly shitfaced in their dorm, and began the festivities. By morning come, the people who did not drink the mysterious, unlabeled concoctions slept soundly in their beds, the ones who could hold their liquor slept a touch less soundly in their beds, and the remaining lightweights were all regretting having nothing but nachos for dinner.
“Is this your first time drinking, kid?” Lucas asked Penny, who was holding onto his bed for dear life. “You’re… like… 3 years older than me, dude.” “That didn’t answer my question.” “…No.” “That was a very slow no.” “Oi, fuck’ead,” Penny stumbled, “I drink. …Alcohol.” “Oh yea?” “Oh yea, all the time. It’s just that, y’know… this time it- the wine was bad.” He lifted his shirt off of one eye, “you’re currently using my bed to stay up.” Penny looked at herself, and pushed herself off. “No I ain’t.” “You were.” “I’m standing on my own.” “You’re wobbling.”
“Alright, listen to me you knife-haired piece of shit,” she said with great emphasis, stumbling back on one leg, “I, am the GREAT P.T., y’hear? I, am unmatched in the ring, and some bullshit fuckin’ cheapass bullshit-ass wine is NOT going to be what TAKES me OUT-”
Penny collapsed mid-sentence directly onto the floor.
“Yea, it’s my first time.”
“Heh, well then welcome, to the wonderful world, of hangovers,” Lucas said, as Artemis heaved once more into the bucket, “if in the future you would like to avoid this particular state of coherence, what you do, is drink plenty a’water, you eat plenty o’fatty foods, and you do not drink unlabeled stuff you do not recognize that your friends hand you.” “So,” she asked while pulling herself back up, ”the opposite of everything we did last night?” “You catch on quick.”
“Why didn’t we eat anythin’, again?” Penny asked, rubbing her face with great vigour. “We had nachos,” he answered, pulling himself upright, “but it was her job to get pizzas,” he said while pointing at Artemis. “My job,” she shot back, “was pizza hut, not free-delivery-hut, and I do not remember anyone paying me for the goddamn pizzas you wanted me to bring here, in the rain.” “Blah, consider it… giving back to the community.” “Oh, trust me, cheapskate, my community contributions have already fucked up my lower back so badly I needed to see a doctor. I don’t need to give out shit.”
While watching petty arguments over who owes who money was somewhat fun, Penny’s stomach began to growl; they all needed food, and now. She scanned the dark and damp room to see which one of these bumbling idiots would be both least annoying and most likely to have money on them: There was Artemis, whose bloodshot eyes and motherly caressing of a bucket did not indicate an ability to go out anywhere. There was Jesse, currently trying to wash her face in a sink that was not producing any water. Ashley passed out the moment she saw a bottle of vodka and was yet to wake up, so better not. Elliot was also out of commission, but she could not tell whether it was from the alcohol or generally from being Elliot. There was no chance Nathaniel would have any money, and even less chance that sleeping on Lucas’s pile of garbage would leave him mission-ready. And while Kevin looked like he would actually have money on him, he was also seemingly the only person here getting a good night’s sleep, so she felt bad waking him up.
Lucas, while annoying, looked both like he would physically make the trip back from the cafeteria and like he had (stolen) money on him. “Hey, dickhead,” she asked him, “you wanna go get some food for the rest of these idiots?” “uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhnnnggggggggggg- sure. This first act’s been taking long enough. Lemme just… hop off and I’ll be right with ya.” He put on his now sweat-and-spit-soaked shirt, nearly landed on Nathaniel while falling off the bed, and the two set off to locate the cafe and bring back plenty of refreshments for Dorm 5’s corpse collection.
Kevin Bacon, eyes wide shut but awake since 4 AM, was regretting signing up to ERA.
Ring ding ding.
The Cafe’s doorbell jingled as two hungover idiots crossed its threshold. It was calm in the Lodge Cafe. Very calm, possibly even a little dead; the loudspeakers were playing a soft tune that was almost trying to put you back to sleep, the air conditioning was set to just a little colder than one would like, and the store itself only contained two other people within its walls - Ridley, sitting on a tall chair and reading through a volume of One Piece, and Artemis, who was currently stocking the display window.
“Hey you two. I’m right now still getting things settled, so I could get’cha coffee or some tea, but if you want anything solid it’s gonna take a few,” she said.
“how did you get here,” Lucas stammered out.
“Hm?”
“You were vomiting like a bitch two minutes ago!” Penny yelled, astonished and somewhat horrified by Artemis’s work ethic, “how are you already on two fuckin’ legs and-… did you make all of those already?!”
Artemis’s head shot up from the display cabinet. “Uh, yeah? I clocked in like an hour ago, dude, it’s not that impressive. The croissants are premade, too. I could have made more of ‘em, but honestly I slept like complete crap so I’m taking it easy this morning.”
“NO SHIT YOU DID, YOU WERE PISSFACE DRUNK! How the FUCK did you get here an hour ago?! You were ASLEEP an hour ago! I SAW YOU!”
“can you teleport,” Lucas asked in a monotone cadence, “did you gain the ability to teleport.”
“Explain yourself now, asshole,” Penny exclaimed while slamming her hand on the counter, “or I’m gonna punt you through the goddamn window!”
“I- You- Huh- I- I don’t know what you two are talking about.”
“BULLSHIT.”
“did he clone you.”
“I don’t- …listen, I know that I work in food service, so I really should be used to this by now, but I am way too tired to have to deal with two maniacs screaming at me at 9:15 in the morning.”
“Wait, how long did it take us to get here?” Penny whispered to Lucas. Lucas, in response, bit his hand, forming a circular-shaped indent in his wrist. He looked at it intently. “I don’t know, my watch is broken.”
“So,” Artemis continued, “if you two have an order you’d like to pitch in, I’d love to hear it. If not, please decide to have your mental breakdown literally anywhere else.”
After a few moments of contemplation and bewilderment, Lucas and Penny decided it would take less mental energy to just accept the fact that Artemis had started making pastries at the same time she was painting a bucket with her insides than it would be to question this situation any further. “Sure, uhhh… what do you got?” Lucas asked. “We have something called a menu, don’t know if you’ve heard of it. They’re long, thin. Have words on them.” “Eh, I don’t really like those, too chewy. What else you got?” “…sigh, we got coffee.”
“Sweet, that will probably help wake up everyone, eh penny? Which of those you got?”
Artemis slowly rested her elbows on the counter. “Well, if you want something cold we have a salted caramel cold brew, a pumpkin cream cold brew, a vanilla sweet, a sweet vanilla, non-dairy salted caramel, a vanilla cold brew, chocolate cream, nitro cold brew, iced caffe americano, vanilla sweet cream nitro cold brew, a clover vertica, an ice shaken espresso, a gelato golden foam with toffeenut, iced honey almondmilk flat, pumpkin spice latte, blonde vanilla latte, iced white chocolate mocha, an iced apple crisp oatmilk macchiato, and an iced apple crisp oatmilk shaken espresso.”
Penny spaced out halfway into the list. “Whawasthat?”
“But if you want something hotter for a nice day like this one, we have a decaf pike roast, caffe misto, reserve tanzania iyenga brewed coffee, a hot flat white, a honey almond milk flat white, a caffe latte with oat milk, one without oatmilk, one with cinnamon dulce, another with dulce de leche, an apple crisp macchiato with oat milk, a white chocolate mocha, pumpkin spice latte, or an oleato caffe latte with oat milk.”
A moment of silence hung in the air.
“How many of those did you make up,” Lucas rhetorically asked. “Can we just like, get a coffee?”
“Those are coffees.”
“Are you tryin’ to fuck with us?” added Penny.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she lied.
“Okay- alright. Ok. Sure. Fine. Drinks, we need drinks. Let’s get a drink. You said that would wake them up, right, dumbass? Did you get any of that?” “They have coffee with an apple in it.” “Ok, sweet, great, fuck, what if we just want somethin’ to eat? You got those?”
“Oh, do you want to hear our sandwich selections? We have specials today, just for you two to enjoy!”
“Oh, fuck me, god in heaven.”
Ridley put on his headphones while quietly praying to have a single moment of rest.
“So, if you want something salty-” “No, no fucking way you’re doing this shit again,” ejaculated Penny, “I can just look at the display case and pick for myself.” “No can do,” said Artemis, “most of these are still somewhat frozen or not actually edible. Some of them are plastic, yknow?” “Alright but- ok, the frozen ones, right?” asked Penny, “can’t you heat them up?” “I could.” “So all’s fine?” “I said could, not will.”
The throbbing pain in Penny’s head got worse, and she was not sure if it was caused more by the dehydration or by the World’s Worst Customer Service, generously heaped on by the Guiness World Record Holder For Most Simultaneous Jobs. “Alright, listen, we just want a big heap of food to feed a bunch of people at once,” Lucas added, placing one affirming hand on Penny’s shoulders, “can we just take that bag of food over there?”
On the end of the counter was a large, transparent bag filled with treats of all kinds - sandwiches, handwiches, pastries, half-melted chocolate - and all of them competing for an ounce of space. Next to it was a sheet of marker stickers and a pen; Artemis did not get around to labelling that sack yet. “Huh.” Artemis contemplated the offer, as Ridley raised the volume on his headphones. “No, you can’t.”
“And why’s that, huh?” Asked Penny in utter exhaustion. “Boss said I can’t.” “Did he, or do you just not want to give us any?” questioned Lucas. “Oh, bosses orders straight from above. But getting to be petty is a bonus,” Artemis said with a shit-eating grin. “I could make you one of our many delectable sandwiches, instead! Only 6.99$ each!”
“Fuckin’… sure. Alright. Start listing them, but for the love of everything,” Penny begged, “let us atleast… tell you whether we want the sandwich. There’s no way I’m remembering that whole list.” The menus sat idly on the counter, unused and forgotten.
“Sure thing sweety! So! First of all we have a simple american cheese grill.”
“Oh that’s pretty good,” answered Lucas, “I think we’ll- we’ll consider that one. What else?”
“We have a gluten-free, artisanal brown bread melt with non-GMO lactose-free aioli, slowly roasted garlic and mustard from the himalayas, brought together by slowly smoked aged pastrami and vegan tomatoes.”
Penny stared forward in confusion. “Wait hold on, fuckin’, vegan tomatoes?”
“Yeah what’s up?”
“Vegan tomatoes.”
“Did you never try vegan tomatoes?”
“Do you have non-vegan tomatoes?” Lucas questioned.
“I could rub a tomato on some ham if you’d like!” responded Artemis, with entirely inappropriate cheer.
“Ok but, like, why is it gluten free?” asked Penny. “..B- be- Because that’s what we have left over?” replied Artemis with genuine astonishment. “Can you take it out?” “Take what out?” “The gluten.” “It’s gluten free.” “I don’t fuckin care if it’s free, can you take it out?” “No.”
“GOD, what’s your problem just makin’ us a stupid sandwich?!” screamed Penny, slamming her hands on the counter right next to Artemis, whose years of customer service inoculated her to threats of physical violence by people below drinking age or above retirement age. “I have no idea what you’re talking about!” she lied with utter glee, “I am just trying to make your sandwich to the best of my ability! You see, as a proud practitioner of the art of teleportation, we are taught from our very first steps out of the womb that we need to use our power for good, to help everyone that crosses our path. To save the world, really. And saving the world means making stale sandwiches on a saturday morning and delivering free pizzas to all those who’d want it!” She put one leg above the other and stood upon the countertop, “I was brought here to this earth to be the best wageslave the world has ever seen, and by jolly, I am going to do my hardest to serve you! My work ethic knows no bounds, and neither does my lower spine!”
Ridley kept trying to increase the already maxed-out volume on his headphones.
“So all you two lovely customers need to do is tell me, oh tell me, what your heart desires, and-” Ring ding ding.
Artemis broke her speech and looked down to realise the two were no longer standing in front of her. Lucas was holding the Lodge’s door open, as Penny held the large bag of assorted food items with both arms. Penny looked at Artemis with a glare that emanated pure rage. “This. Has been. The worst day of my fucking life. And it’s just eight in the fuckin’ morning!” Artemis tried to correct her, “It’s actually nine thirty-”
“SHUT IT! You red-haired goddamn DEVIL! I don’t give a SHIT anymore about you- your- fuc- your STUPID gluten-extra mayo-laden extra-spicy garlic-roasted double-dipped ranch-free funky-mode MA-CHI-A-TOES! I am DONE! I am NEVER steppin’ foot in this FLEABOX of a FOOD PLACE, and we are TAKIN’ THIS SHIT as RECOMPENSE for the NINE FOOT WORD-DICK YOU JUST SHOVED INTO MY SKULL. If I see you ONE MORE TIME, ANYWHERE, for ANY REASON, it’s ON THE SPOT. Your boob-window crop top will be in EIGHT PLACES AT ONCE. I. Am the GREAT P.T. And I will TURN YOU INTO PULP.”
They exited the cafe, and the door slowly closed in on itself.
\ \ \
The two troublemakers left the Lodge in a huff, and as the door fully closed in on itself, the morning’s peace and quiet slowly returned to the room. Artemis lowered herself down, sitting on the countertop, and letting out a sigh of relief knowing the day could not get any worse than now.
Ridley slowly took off one side of his headphones, “say, weren’t you supposed to throw all of those expired sandwiches to the trash?”
“They don’t need to know that.”